


Outbreak

by Untherius



Series: The Sun-Bearer Chronicles [3]
Category: Disney Princesses, Howl Series - Diana Wynne Jones, Tangled (2010)
Genre: F/M, Zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-09
Updated: 2011-10-09
Packaged: 2017-10-24 10:37:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/262536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Untherius/pseuds/Untherius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During what should have been the remainder of her vacation, Rapunzel finds herself in the middle of a Class-3 Solanum outbreak.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Outbreak

Rapunzel awoke to a growling in her stomach. Her appetite had increased dramatically since she'd awoken amid the wreckage of Megan's hot tub. She was certain it had something to do with what had happened to her on Ingary, but it was all so difficult to grasp. She didn't even understand half of what Howl had been saying about quantum this and subspatial that. Scientific knowledge in her own time wasn't remotely close to that level. Before Howl had departed back to Wales, he'd told her some of what Calcifer had said about sun-tears and sun-blood and that she shouldn't worry about it. Naturally, she worried about it anyway. Whatever it was, it wasn't natural and that concerned her. Moreover, it was doing something to her and that concerned her even more. What truly alarmed her was what she'd seen on that computer monitor—something else she didn't understand. That it might happen again and that next time she might actually hurt, even kill, someone, terrified her.

Her breakfast requests had grown over the last few days. This morning, one of the kitchen staff had brought her eight six-inch whole-grain pancakes, a pound of bacon, half a pound of breakfast sausage, twelve eggs cooked over-easy, five cups of applesauce, three peaches, a pound of strawberries, a quart of orange juice and a half-gallon of whole milk. Her lunch request had been equally impressive, which included two eight-inch roasted red pepper and spinach quiches and a summer sausage. She quickly got dressed and dug into her food with a nearly-inhuman aggression. There was quite a bit of commotion coming from downstairs, but she barely noticed it as she inhaled her breakfast.

There'd been an outbreak of some strange illness that began shortly after her arrival and had the whole island in a tizzy. No one seemed to know anything useful about it. She figured all the noise might have something to do with that, but she'd been far too distracted by her own predicament to think about it too much.

Finishing her food, she decided she could use some exercise and walked to the door, but paused. The guest suite she'd been given at the Princess Palace was modest, but still at least twice the size of the tower in which she'd spent the first eighteen years of her life, and on the third floor. Was all that racket really coming from downstairs? She was suddenly aware of how loud it was and...was that screaming? She had a bad feeling about this, but curiosity overcame her apprehension and she opened the door, stepping out into the hallway. The sounds were much louder now. She followed them toward the main staircase, the breakfast bulge in her abdomen bobbing uncomfortably—she still wasn't sure how she'd been managing to shove that much food down her gullet over and over for the last four days.

She rounded a bend in the grand staircase leading down to the main hall and froze. The sight before her was truly horrific. Down below, she watched as a butler grabbed a chambermaid and bit her on the neck, severing her carotid artery. Another staff-member shuffled across the room to join the butler in his attack on the poor maid. At least one dismembered body lay on the floor and there were blood smears everywhere. She recognized—but just barely--what was left of Princess Jasmine. The sight churned her stomach and, in several violent spasms, it emptied itself all over the stairs in front of her.

She'd barely recovered from that when she noticed something else that send a new wave of fear and nausea surging through her body. Halfway down the final flight lay the partially-devoured body of Princess Tiana. Crouching over it, and now looking directly at Rapunzel, were Sleepy and Dopey, two staff-members, and Princess Belle. Their eyes were wide and vacant-looking, blood was all over their lower faces, bits of human flesh hung from their jaws and they grasped more of Tiana's remains in their fists. A pregnant pause ensued and then they dropped everything, staggered up onto wobbly legs and began to lurch toward Rapunzel, moaning in a particularly unsettling way that made all of her hair stand up on end. She shrieked, staggering backward to bump into the window behind her. The others kept coming, slipping on the vomit spewn on the stairs. She looked left and right to see more people in similar states of carnage shambling toward her. She screamed in terror, throwing her arms out in front of her.

Suddenly, there was a violent explosion and she was thrown backward through the window. As she flew through the air, she saw flames erupting from all the other windows and the whole building was quickly engulfed in fire. Then she hit the ground, the impact knocking her unconscious.

*****

Rapunzel awoke looking up at white canvas. It fluttered in a light breeze. She slowly sat up and looked around. She appeared to be on a cot in a field hospital tent, but open on all sides. The events of that morning—at least she thought it was that morning—came back to her and she gasped, then groaned as she became aware of the pain in her left shoulder, ribs and somewhere inside. It wasn't that much worse than what she'd experienced on the hardest days of combat training and it was more of a collection of acute aches than anything, but it still hurt. She recognized Howl's voice.

“Howl?” she croaked.

He walked briskly under the covering from outside, followed by Sophie. “Oh, good, you're awake.”

“What happened this time?” she asked and flopped back onto the cot. “Ow!”

“Be careful,” said Sophie, “You have...taken quite a beating. You have a...” She stopped, sighed in frustration and looked at Howl, who picked up the verbal part of the diagnosis for her.

“...dislocated left shoulder, three cracked ribs, a bruised kidney and a ruptured spleen. Sophie repaired the worst of the damage, mainly to give you a head start.”

Rapunzel groaned.

“You're healing surprisingly well and miraculously quickly,” Howl continued. “At this rate, you'll be mostly recovered in a week or so and mostly on your own. Anyone else would take at least two or three months to make even half that much progress.”

“What are you doing here?”

“One of the advantages of being from the future is that we know what happened in the past. That, and I've made the arrangements to have you visit that specialist I mentioned. More than anything, we just had good timing,” said Howl.

“What about the...” her brow furrowed “...what happened to those people? It was terrible!”

“Solanum, I'm afraid,” said Sophie.

“What?”

“It's a virus.”

“What's that?”

“It's a very very small...thing,” explained Howl. “The same sort of contagion that causes diseases like influenza and small-pox. Only this one is much, much worse...worse than all other Earth diseases put together, in my opinion. Don't worry, it's only contagious if someone with the virus bites you. You haven't come into contact with any fluids, have you?”

“No. At least I don't think so.”

“Well, it's been more than 24 hours since the incident and since this one has an incubation period of twelve hours, it's safe to say you're clear.” Sophie picked up a clipboard and scribbled something on some paper attached to it. “Therefore, she's releasing you into her immediate medical care.” Howl looked at his wife. “Strictly speaking, she doesn't have the authority to do that, but she just did anyway and by the time the supervising physician here notices, we'll be long gone.”

“As soon as we have all non-infected persons out,” continued Howl, “we'll have to sanitize this entire island. I'll probably use an intense lighting storm, maybe nudge some space debris out of orbit. Officially, it'll be a naquadriah-enhanced neutron bomb like the one that detonated over Las Vegas two days ago.”

“I...don't understand. Is that big?”

“Yes, very. There won't be much left, except a bunch of large head-shaped statues, but we need to squash this. We've already evacuated Snow White, Ariel, Tiger Lily, Pocahontas, Dora, Diego and a few others.”

“Will they be alright?”

“We think so,” said Sophie, “but...” she rolled her eyes and looked at Howl.

Howl picked up the explanation, as before. “Snow White was treated for smoke inhalation and burns and is being kept under sedation, but will probably need tranquilizers for a few months and psychotherapy for years. Ariel is in a coma from near-drowning and we think she'll come out of it in four and a half months. Pocahontas broke an ankle. Tiger Lily picked up Giardia. Diego was bitten by a couple of ticks and might have contracted Lyme Disease. Dora has a poison oak reaction. All four of _them_ have minor frostbite. Aurora was elsewhere, but is dealing with some survivor guilt. Otherwise....”

“Oh, dear,” said Rapunzel and sighed.

“We'd better go now,” said Howl.

Howl and Sophie helped Rapunzel up and they walked across a small field, through a free-standing door and into the Jenkins home in Wales.

**Author's Note:**

> Who doesn't love zombies, right? I follow the Max Brooks school of thought regarding the zombie virus, how it spreads, how the infected behave, etc.  
> This story, as well as the entire arc I'm following with Rapunzel and what's happening to her, really began after I read "Slave Bear of Carealot." I recommend reading said work IF AND ONLY IF you have copious amounts of brain bleach available!!! I envisioned "Care Brains" as a loose sequel to that in which the zombie virus comes to the land of Carealot and, well, all hell breaks loose. While I have yet to actually write that work, the ideas for it spawned more ideas. After I saw "Tangled"--and later "Thor"--the whole thing reached a sort of critical mass and kind of snowballed into its own thing.  
> If you continue to follow the Sun-Bearer Chronicles, you'll see what I mean. Oh, and if you think I'm smoking something, please don't hesitate to let me know. While I primarily write the stories I want to write, it's always good to know if, where, and how I may be losing my audience. If nothing else, this can help me improve as a storyteller.


End file.
